Yemen Government Launches Major Military Operation to Retake Houthi-Held Territory as Fighting Intensifies Near Taiz

Yemen Government Launches Major Military Operation to Retake Houthi-Held Territory as Fighting Intensifies Near Taiz

ADEN, October 4, 2026 [VoM News]: Fighting in Yemen is mounting with the government announcing a major military operation to retake territory controlled by the Houthi rebels.Yemen has declared a major military offensive to retake territory from the Houthis, as fighting continues to intensify.

Violence surrounding the Iranian-backed Houthis’ stronghold of Taiz escalated on Sunday as Yemen’s internationally recognised government declared the beginning of a major battle for retaking land they have seized from the government and restoring state authority throughout the country.

Government forces were instructed to start operating according to approved military plans, said Information available with VoM News Rashad al-Alimi, chairman of the Presidential Leadership Council in Yemen. I declare that the military operations for the liberation of the rest of the nation’s territories and the spread of the state and its institutions on the nation’s territory have begun,” al-Alimi said.

The move comes after the Houthis have made a significant number of military achievements, such as making progress in the Red Sea and around the Bab al-Mandab Strait, one of the world’s most vital shipping passages, in Yemen. Hours before al-Alimi’s announcement, the Houthis cut a key supply road connecting the government-held city of Taiz with Aden, the interim capital of Yemen’s internationally recognised government, according to security and military sources cited by AFP.

Houthi forces took control of Al-Safiya and seized a police station and shut down the main road, a police source said. Three Yemeni military sources also confirmed the loss of the supply route and that fighting is ongoing in the area. Taiz itself was never under the control of the government, but the Houthis began to exert pressure on the city from multiple fronts. Its latest development has further limited access with government held lands to the south.

The conflict has also made its way into Yemen’s Saudi Arabian border. Yahya Saree, a spokesman for the Houthis, said the group fired ballistic missiles and drones at Saudi Aramco sites in Riyadh and the Khurais area. Saudi officials were not immediately able to confirm those allegations.

The Saudi-backed Yemen government forces’ coalition has continued to conduct dozens of operations against the Houthis’ forces and reinforcements at the Taiz axis and other fronts, meanwhile.

Yemen’s latest clashes are part of a more violent spate of the country’s long-running conflict, which started after Houthis took control of the capital, Sanaa, in 2014. In 2015, a Saudi-backed coalition stepped in on behalf of the internationally-backed government.

The escalation of violence in many parts of the country, particularly around Taiz, the Red Sea coast, and other conflict hotspots, could further hinder civilian life, humanitarian access, and regional shipping, albeit access to areas in conflict has already been severely compromised in many places.